In today’s competitive job market, your resume is your golden ticket to landing your dream job. Creating an eye-catching document to effectively illustrate your skills and qualifications is crucial in your job hunt.
A resume is a comprehensive document that summarizes your professional or career life. It includes your: background, work experience, education, skills, and achievements.
It should be purposefully designed to showcase your qualifications to attract potential employers by making you stand out in the job application process. This will in turn increase your chances of securing an interview.
What a Good Resume Does For You
A well-structured resume needs to demonstrate that:
- You’re an ideal candidate for the position.
- Your skills will contribute to the company’s profitability.
- You have the expertise to address the company’s challenges.
- You’ll provide value that justifies your salary.
- Your achievements are quantifiable and proven.
10 Steps to Creating a Great Resume
- Gather all the necessary and relevant information you need. This includes your skills, achievements, experience, and education.
- Select a great format that is either chronological or well laid out.
- Put your name and your contact information in bold in an attractive header.
- Start with a resume profile, a resume summary, or a resume objective, this is where you sell yourself.
- Create your work experience section next. Start from your latest experience in chronological order to your oldest.
- Indicate roles and
- Formulate a skills section incorporating both people (teamwork and organizational skills) and professional skills.
- Your education history should follow next, including relevant certifications, and things like high school and primary are not necessary.
- Don’t forget to add some additional sections to prove you’re the perfect candidate.
- Last but not least, proofread! Edit, correct, rewrite, reread. Make sure it’s flawless before sending it out for the world to see.
Things To Avoid in Your CV
- Too much unnecessary information e.g. marital status, relationship status, Identity Card number, or religion.
- Avoid using vague language. Words such as probably, may, might, could, might, and some are very unprofessional and could give a wrong impression of your work ethic and personality.
- Lots of your hobbies and interests. Only add them if they are related to the position.
- An unprofessional email address like beautifulprincess@gmail.com. Create a professional email address with your first, last, and middle name (if needed).
- Avoid grammatical errors. You don’t want to ruin a good first impression. Use software such as Grammarly to omit those ugly typos.
- Don’t throw in the worn-out line “References available upon request.” Leave it blank if not requested.
Should I Use ChatGPT (AI) To Write?
It is 2024 and ChatGPT is widely in use for writing and formatting globally. AI is great since it:
- provides quick and tailored suggestions and autocorrections
- helps curate content to ensure clarity and professionalism
- helps in structuring and optimizing keywords
However, it might fail to capture specific industry insights. So make sure to review and customize your work to reflect your unique experiences and personality.
Recruiters only spend around seven seconds to scan a resume so make sure it’s worth reading through. Avoid the common mistakes we have listed in this guide and always proofread and check your resume before submission.
Good luck nailing that position!
